Price Floors and Employer Preferences: Evidence from a Minimum Wage Experiment

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Horton, John J.
• 署名单位: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); National Bureau of Economic Research
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0002-8282
• DOI: 10.1257/aer.20170637
• 发表日期: 2025
• 页码: 117-146
• 关键词: substitution

摘要

Firms posting job openings in an online labor market were randomly assigned minimum hourly wages. When facing a minimum wage, fewer firms hired, but those they did hire paid higher wages. Hours- worked fell substantially. Treated firms shifted to hiring more productive workers. Using the platform's imposition of a market-wide minimum wage after the experiment, I find that many of the experimental results also hold in equilibrium, including the substitution towards more productive workers. However, there was also a large reduction in the number of jobs posted for which the minimum wage would likely bind. ( JEL J22, J23, J31, J38)